


Comfort and Consent

by Scrawlers



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Established Relationship, Light Bondage, M/M, Post-Canon, also mentions of past trauma, no actual sex though, talk of sex and sexual things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-20 18:34:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17027853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrawlers/pseuds/Scrawlers
Summary: Yuugi wants to try something new in the bedroom one night, but while Jounouchi wants to indulge him, incidents from his past make it impossible for him to be comfortable with the situation. Yuugi notices Jounouchi's discomfort despite Jounouchi's insistence that he's fine, and opens up an important conversation on why having boundaries is not only okay, but strongly encouraged.





	Comfort and Consent

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a few years ago, but in light of Tumblr being . . . Tumblr, I've decided to archive everything here, just in case.
> 
> This takes place after Jounouchi and Yuugi have been romantically involved for about six months, and as such they’re in their mid-twenties—specifically, 23/24.

It’s after Jounouchi has pulled his own shirt off over his head and tossed it on the floor that Yuugi, sitting back on the foot of the bed, says, “Hey, I was thinking . . . maybe we could try something new tonight.”

“Oh?” Jounouchi grins as he leans back on his hands, his right leg stretched out so he can wiggle his toes against Yuugi’s knee. Yuugi laughs a little, and his own smile becomes a little less hesitant and a little more impish as he reaches down to open one of the drawers beneath the foot of the bed.

“Yeah,” he says. “Nothing too crazy since we’re still taking things slow, but I figure since we’ve had a bit more practice now we could maybe do things a little differently.”

“What’ve you got in mind?” Jounouchi asks, but instead of answering verbally, Yuugi pulls two objects up out of the drawer and holds them up for Jounouchi to see. The second Jounouchi’s eyes fall on them his stomach drops, and with it his smile. It takes his brain half a second to catch up and realize why. “Oh.”

Yuugi’s holding a set of handcuffs in each hand. All four cuffs are covered in what looks like black velvet, and the chain connecting each pair is as well. The velvet has a soft shine under their bedroom lights; it certainly looks plush enough, but that doesn’t soothe the cotton-like feeling suddenly clogging Jounouchi’s throat, or the way his heart is thumping like the foot of an agitated rabbit in his chest.

His lack of enthusiasm isn’t lost on Yuugi, whose own smile fades in response as he lowers the cuffs to his lap. “We don’t have to,” he says quickly. “I just thought—it looked fun in one of the videos I saw the other day, and—”

“You watched some without me?” Jounouchi asks, and he can’t help but sound a little indignant. Yuugi grins again, but Jounouchi can still see the contrition in his eyes.

“Sorry,” he says. “I found it online when you weren’t home, and I got curious . . . but anyway, like I said, I just thought it looked like it might be fun, but if you’re not into it I—”

“No, no, it’s okay,” Jounouchi says, and as Yuugi gives him a dubious look, Jounouchi clears his throat and does his best to put on a brave face. “I’m always up for trying something new, you know me.”

“You don’t seem very excited,” Yuugi says.

“It just took me by surprise, that’s all. I wasn’t expecting it. ‘Sides, it’s just handcuffs, right? A little bondage, no big deal. It’s not very kinky, or anything. Not compared to some of the  _other_ stuff we’ve seen.” Jounouchi pauses, and then grins, doing his best to make it natural as he says, “Remember the—?”

“Nope,” Yuugi says loudly, and that’s enough to give Jounouchi the strength to smile more readily. “Nope, nope, no, we’re not going there again, we’re not remembering that.”

“But you  _do_ —”

“ _No_ , we’re not talking about that ever again! That was a mistake and you know it.” Yuugi gives him a faux-annoyed look. “Or were you not the one who shouted at the laptop to stop before you shut it and threw it across the couch like it was on fire?”

“Look, how was I supposed to know  _that’s_ what they were going to do with the—?” Jounouchi begins, but as the memory resurfaces even he can’t stomach it, and so he presses his lips together, swallows, and shakes his head. “Nope. You’re right. I’m sorry I brought it up. That was really gross and I don’t want to think about it either.”

“Told you,” Yuugi mutters, but his cheeks are still flushed red at the memory as he stares down at the handcuffs in his hands. Jounouchi stares at them as well, his palms sweaty against the bedspread and his breath still feeling short in his chest, though in his case it isn’t because of the disturbingly kinky video he had made them both remember.

“Anyway,” he says after a moment, and Yuugi looks back up at him. “Like I said, we can try this. I mean, it’s not . . .  _that_. It won’t be that bad. I mean,” he adds quickly, “it could be really fun, like you said! So let’s do it.”

“Are you sure?” Yuugi presses, and Jounouchi nods, scooting back on the bed, closer to the headboard. 

“Yep. Like I said, I’m always up for trying new things, and if you want to, then I’m game. Besides, you bought those, right? So we shouldn’t let the money go to waste. Let’s give it a shot.”

“Well . . . if you’re  _really_ sure . . .” Yuugi says, and when Jounouchi nods and smiles again, Yuugi’s smile returns as he follows Jounouchi back to the headboard. “But we’re just trying it out. We don’t have to go very far or do anything else in addition to this. We can work up to that.”

“Yeah,” Jounouchi says. His voice doesn’t sound as strong as he’d like it to, and Yuugi’s eyes flicker to his, but when Jounouchi stares solidly back, Yuugi just gently takes his right wrist and pulls it up to the headboard. Jounouchi tries not to tense up with the cuff snaps around his wrist.

“It’s just an experiment,” Yuugi says, and in lieu of answering Jounouchi just nods when the cuff is secure and Yuugi moves on to cuff his other wrist to the other side. Despite the velvet covering the cuff and the chain, he can still hear a muffled jingle when he moves his cuffed arm. “Just to see how we feel, you know. Just to see how we like it.”

“Uh-huh,” Jounouchi says. Even with the velvet he still hears the  _click_ as the second set of cuffs locks into place, and he swallows against the rising rate of his heartbeat, and tries to ignore the alarm ringing in his head.

It’s different, he knows, from all the other times. It’s nothing like the other times. It’s not like the time that officer cuffed him in junior high to scare him, to threaten him with the possibility of hauling him down to the station if he didn’t clean up his act and stop screwing around (even though Jounouchi knew he wouldn’t follow through, or that even if he did it wouldn’t have gone anywhere, because back then Hirutani wouldn’t have stood for his  _partner_ getting sent off to juvie). It’s not like it was in the basement of “Murder Mansion” during Death-T, when Jouji snapped a cuff around his wrist, chaining him to an axe murderer in a room slick with oil. It’s not like it was at the pier, either, even though Yuugi’s eyes are meeting Jounouchi’s now just as they had back then. The cuffs digging against his wrists are plush and warm, not sharp and cold, and though he’s chained and can’t move—can’t free himself . . . although he’s stuck—restrained,  _bound_ —he’s not . . . not  _trapped_ , it’s not like it was before, it’s—

Jounouchi blinks, and realizes a second too late that Yuugi had scrambled back down to the foot of the bed to retrieve something from the drawer. It takes Yuugi crawling back and kneeling up over Jounouchi to realize that what Yuugi had gone for was a key, which he uses to unlock the cuff around Jounouchi’s left wrist without preamble.

“What are you doing?” Jounouchi asks, as Yuugi tosses the cuffs down to the floor. “We haven’t even done anything yet.”

“You don’t like it,”  Yuugi says simply, as he moves over to get the other pair of cuffs off Jounouchi’s wrist.

Jounouchi frowns. “I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to,” Yuugi says, and he sounds a little exasperated. “I could tell. I’ve known you long enough for that by now.”

“Yeah, but . . .” When the second set of cuffs falls Jounouchi instinctively rubs at his right wrist, despite the fact that the velvet had prevented the cuffs from causing him any pain. It’s instinct more than anything, and he stops when he notices Yuugi glance at his hands. “It was just new, that’s all. I was just getting used to it. It’s seriously not a big deal. If you want to, we ca—”

“I don’t,” Yuugi says, and as Jounouchi opens his mouth to point the obvious lie he adds, “I did, but I don’t anymore. Not if it makes you uncomfortable.”

“Yuugi, I’m fine,” Jounouchi stresses. “Seriously, I am! It’s—”

“No, you’re uncomfortable with it. I know you’re  _saying_ you’re fine, and I get that you want to do this for me, but I can tell it makes you uncomfortable. And if you’re uncomfortable, I’m uncomfortable, so . . .” Yuugi shrugs. “I don’t want to do it anymore. That’s all.”

Yuugi isn’t mad, and in truth he doesn’t even sound that disappointed, but Jounouchi feels shame spill over him like a bucket of ice water anyway. It’s stupid to react the way he does, he knows, and it’s stupid—it’s stupid that he can’t . . . that he can’t dothis _one thing_  for Yuugi because of it. It isn’t Yuugi’s fault that Jounouchi was a delinquent loser back in junior high, nor is it Yuugi’s fault that Jounouchi was careless when rescuing Jouji during Death-T, leading to him getting cuffed back then, nor is it Yuugi’s fault that Jounouchi succumbed to the Millennium Rod—that he let Malik control him as he did, leading to them both being chained to that anchor. Yuugi had nothing to do with any of Jounouchi’s past failings, and yet here he is, having to deal with the fallout from them. It isn’t a big deal, it really isn’t. They’re just handcuffs, and they’re covered in velvet at that, no doubt because Yuugi thought ahead and tried to get the least offensive pairs he could find. But Jounouchi still can’t handle it, still can’t do this  _one thing_ for him, still can’t man up and get over things that happened a decade or so ago, and now Yuugi has to deal with the fallout of it. Even if he doesn’t seem disappointed, Jounouchi doesn’t see how he isn’t, and so he swallows before he says, “I’m sorry.”

“Huh? What for?” Yuugi asks, and his bewildered tone makes Jounouchi huff a laugh at the absurdity of it. He runs a hand through his hair as he looks up, though instead of looking at Yuugi, he looks over at the wall by the bathroom door instead.

“For . . . freaking out, you know. Ruining it.” He gestures down at one of the discarded pairs of handcuffs on the floor. “You wanted to try it, and I just . . .” He lets his hand fall back to the bed. “Sorry.”

“What are you talk—you didn’t ruin anything,” Yuugi says, and when Jounouchi gives him a flat look he says more firmly, “You didn’t, I mean it. There’s nothing wrong with being uncomfortable with something and you don’t have to apologize for it.”

“For that?” Jounouchi says, and he jerks his head back to the cuffs again. “Come on, they’re completely tame and I couldn’t even handle—”

“It doesn’t matter how tame they are,” Yuugi says. “What matters is you didn’t like it, and that’s fine. You don’t have to like everything, and it’s okay to say you don’t. In fact, you  _should_ say it. Don’t pretend to like something for my sake, okay? You don’t have to go along with it just because I want to. I’d rather you tell me if you didn’t.”

Jounouchi scoffs. “Right, because it’s real impressive that I can’t man up enough to even handle something small like this.”

“It has nothing to do with—!” Yuugi makes a frustrated sound in the back of his throat and puts his face in his hands. After a second he scrubs his palms down his face, and then says calmly, “Katsuya. If we were messing around, and we started doing something that hurt or made me uncomfortable, what would you want to do?”

“Stop,” Jounouchi says immediately, and he doesn’t have to think about it—doesn’t have to  _consider_ it, because the very thought that he could ever do anything to hurt Yuugi makes him feel a little sick. Yuugi nods.

“Right. And you’d want me to say it if it got to that point, right? You’d want to know if you were accidentally doing something that was hurting me, or made me uncomfortable?”

“Of course, Yuugi, I—”

“And you wouldn’t think less of me, would you? You wouldn’t think I wasn’t being a man, or that I was being disappointing or anything like that, right?”

“Of course not. You know I wouldn’t—”

“Then, see?” Yuugi says, and he pokes Jounouchi lightly in the chest. “You don’t want to hurt me, and you wouldn’t think any less of me if I didn’t want to do something. But it’s the same for me;  _I_ don’t want to hurt  _you_ , and I don’t think any less of  _you_ if you don’t want to do something. Being uncomfortable doesn’t make you less of a man, and you don’t have to put up with things that make you uncomfortable to prove a point, or make me happy, or whatever it is you’re thinking. You’re allowed to have boundaries just as much as I am, and I want you to be as comfortable as I am, too. So if you’re not comfortable with something, we just won’t do it, or we’ll stop if we were doing it before. It’s really not a big deal, and I’m not disappointed, and you don’t have to apologize for it. You don’t have anything to be sorry for.” He smiles, and his smile is so sweet that Jounouchi thinks his heart has actually melted from the sudden warmth that rushes through him. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Jounouchi says, and he ducks his head as Yuugi’s smile grows, because god, when did he become so weak to that? “Okay. Thanks.”

“Nope. You’ve got nothing to thank me for, either. I’m just saying what anyone and everyone should,” Yuugi says.

“Yeah, but still,” Jounouchi says, and he reaches over to take Yuugi’s hand in his own. Yuugi’s fingers twine easily and immediately with Jounouchi’s, and Jounouchi runs his thumb along Yuugi’s knuckles. “And hey, this doesn’t have to be forever, right? I could get used to it, or warm up to the idea at some point. We could always try—”

“If you decide you  _really_ want to later on, then sure,” Yuugi says. “But until then, I really mean it when I say I’m not interested. It sounded like a kind of fun idea, but that was all it was: an idea. Something to try, just to see how we liked it. It really never mattered all that much to me whether we did it or not.” He squeezes Jounouchi’s hand gently as he says, “Just  _being_ with you is enough for me, Katsuya.”

If Jounouchi felt weak in the face of Yuugi’s smile, that’s nothing compared to how Yuugi’s words make him feel now. He kisses Yuugi before he can help himself, releasing Yuugi’s hand so that he can cup his cheek, his other arm wrapping around Yuugi’s waist. Yuugi smiles against Jounouchi’s mouth, and he links his arms around Jounouchi’s neck to pull himself closer.

 _I love you,_ Jounouchi wants to say, as their lips move in sync. He combs his fingers through Yuugi’s hair as Yuugi pulls himself flush against Jounouchi’s chest.  _I love you, and thank you, and I love you, I love you so_ freaking  _much._

Jounouchi lets himself fall back against the headboard, and even though they break their kiss briefly to catch their breath, Yuugi leans his forehead against Jounouchi’s, and they smile as their eyes lock. Jounouchi says nothing, but he can feel Yuugi’s heartbeat against his own chest, and as Yuugi kisses him again, Jounouchi knows that he understands anyway.


End file.
